Blasts Hit Security Buildings in Damascus as Army Kills 21 in Hama

Twin bombs exploded near a tightly guarded government compound in the heart of Damascus on Sunday, state media said, as an army assault on a rural area of the central province of Hama killed at least 21 people, according to activists.

Four people were wounded in the twin bombings which struck in the Abu Remmaneh district where several security service buildings and the office of Vice President Farouq al-Sharaa are located, state television said.

The Ahfad al-Rasul (Grandchildren of the Prophet) brigade of the rebel Free Syrian Army claimed responsibility for the attack in a statement on Facebook, in which it also threatened to attack Assad's palace.

State media earlier Sunday reported that a car bomb explosion near a mosque at Sbeneh in the southern outskirts of the capital the previous day killed 15 people. Sbeneh is a poor neighborhood where anti-government sentiment is strong.

The watchdog gave a preliminary toll of 103 people killed countrywide on Sunday, including 66 civilians.

It said an army assault on a rural area of the central province of Hama killed at least 21 people.

"The number of victims of a military operation in the area of Al-Fan is likely to rise, because several people have been reported missing, while some of the wounded are in a critical condition," said the Observatory.

The Observatory had no details available on whether those killed were civilians or rebel fighters. "But all 21 of the dead were men," said the group's director Rami Abdel Rahman.

State news agency SANA said all of the dead were members of "an armed terrorist group that was attacking citizens and security forces."

A clash with the army had "resulted in the killing of all the group members and the confiscation of their weapons," it added.

Horrific images shot and posted on YouTube by activists in al-Fan showed a long row of bodies shrouded in white cloths, laid out on the ground, with scores of men, women and children crying.

Hama is among the key arenas of Syria's 17-month uprising against the regime of President Bashar Assad.

Also Sunday, the Britain-based Observatory reported that the army had targeted homes in the capital for destruction, using bulldozers.

It said regime forces stormed the restive outskirts of the upscale Damascus district of Mazzeh, demolishing three shops and five homes.

The violence in the capital came as the army renewed its bombardment of rebel-held areas in the provinces.

Shelling of Qusayr destroyed the last working bakery in the rebel-held part of the central town, activists said, aggravating a growing food shortage and highlighting the plight of civilians trapped by the fighting.

Human rights watchdogs have expressed growing concern about deteriorating conditions in areas under protracted siege and bombardment by the army, including parts of second city Aleppo and third city Homs.

"The shelling of Hanano did not stop from midnight until 5:00 am," an activist told Agence France Presse from the pro-opposition northeastern district of Aleppo, a city of some 2.7 million people and a major battleground between troops and rebels since July 20.

"People are used to the power cuts, but the most difficult thing is getting hold of medicines, food and milk," the activist told AFP by Skype.